EU Funding Available For Multi-city Smart Lighting Development

The European Commission anticipates providing up to €70 million to collaborative multi-city LED lighting projects similar to an innovative Genoa-led program that landed €3.5 million in Commission funding for six cities earlier this year.

Khalil Rouhana, director of the components and systems group in the EC’s Directorate General for Communications, Networks, Content and Technology (DG Connect), said the money would be available from the EC’s overarching 7-year €80 billion Horizon 2020 research and development programme.

Speaking at the EC’s two-day ICT Key Enabling Technologies conference in Rome, Rouhana encouraged funding applicants to demonstrate a collaborative approach that could involve several cities interested in combining forces to advance intelligent lighting schemes. Collaborations ideally would also include industry and academia.

The conference, held in Rome in October addressed a broad set of technologies to support the connected ‘Internet of things’ including lighting, smart cities, manufacturing, photonics, nanoelectronics, microelectronics and others. It also covered how closer collaboration between cities across Europe could help LED lighting become a key driver in achieving smart, sustainable cities.